Emor 5773: Memory & Celebration - We Need Both

What a week we just had

We started with Yom HaZikaron but before we could get to Yom HaAtzmaut, there was the tragedy in Boston . . .  then the fertilizer plant explosion in Texas.  Ricin-laced letters.  Then the hunt for suspects.

As the satirical online magazine "The Onion" mock reported, Maryland resident James Alderman said  "Seriously, can we wrap this up already? Because, you know, I'm pretty sure we've all had our hearts ripped out of our chests and stomped on enough times for one seven-day period, thank you very much." 

And that was what The Onion published online before Boston was closed all day on Friday and we entered the weekend with one Boston Marathon bombing suspect dead and the other captured. 

Then there were storms that flooded Chicago, discovery of possible life-supporting planets, a 7.0-magnitude earthquake hitting China. What a week!

The idea of a week, counting time in seven day increments is one Jewish gift to the world.  

And as Jews we use this season to count days through Sefirat HaOmer (counting each day between Pesach and Shavuot -- counting the days from liberation through the Exodus and taking responsibility through receiving Torah).  The days are the same whether we count or not, but counting them changes something in us. 

This week’s parshah, Emor, is about the power of we relate to time.  We tend to imagine that time has power over us.  We find ourselves running out of time or racing to keep up with time.  But the Torah teaches that the only power time has over us is what we give up – what we cede to time.

For example, the parshah begins with two types of mo'ed or seasons.  Each marks a different type of time.  One is the weekly Shabbat and the other are the seasonal festivals on the Jewish calendar.

Each is distinct in origin as well.  Shabbat is literally set by God as a mark of the end of the first week of Creation and people have been repeating it every seven days since.  (Still, even Shabbat is virtually meaningless unless people relate to it as special.)  

The other is set by human beings observing the moon.  In fact, Talmud relates a story about the hosts of heaven asking God when Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur will be this year.  God's answer, in effect, "Why are you asking me!?! Let's go to the human court that takes testimony about the new moon and ask them." (Devarim Rabbah)   

The parshah is telling us that each is an essential element of time -- how we are inspired to use it and how we enact that inspiration.  

Mo'ed also is a term to describe a human gathering.  The Ohel Mo'ed (Tent of Gathering) is the term Torah uses to describe the portable tabernacle in the wilderness journey.  

In other words our sense of time depends both on how we prepare for using it and with whom we gather to spend it.  

In all these ways then we are the masters of time -- not only by counting it but also by making it count.  That is exactly what the Israeli Knesset did when it established Yom HaZikaron on the day before Yom HaAtzmaut.  In the early years of the State of Israel there was only Yom HaAtzmaut.  Most citizens spent the day at the cemetery remembering those of their family and friends who died establishing or defending the Israel in those early years.  

Israeli leaders felt that type of remembering was essential but not sufficient for the celebration of independence.  As a result the Knesset added Yom HaZikaron (Memorial Day) to the Israeli calendar.  Now Israelis have both remembrance and celebration.  We each need both.